[agents] [ESAW'08]2nd CALL FOR PARTICIPATION

[Laurent Vercouter]

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                             2nd CALL FOR PARTICIPATION
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                         Ninth International Workshop
            "Engineering Societies in the Agents World" (ESAW 08),

                            September 24-26 2008,

      Ecole Nationale Superieure des Mines de Saint-Etienne (ENSM-SE),
                            Saint-Etienne, France

                          http://www.emse.fr/esaw08

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REGISTRATION AVAILABLE HERE: http://www.emse.fr/esaw08/registration.php

TECHNICAL PROGRAMME:

*Wednesday 24th September*

08:30  Registration

09:30  Workshop start & welcome

10:00  Session “Organisations, norm-governed systems”
   - Alexander Artikis and Jeremy Pitt. Specifying Open Agent Systems: A 
Survey
   - Sebnem Bora, Ali Murat Tiryaki and Oguz Dikenelli. A Load Sharing 
Approach Based on Refactoring of Roles in Multi-Agent Systems
   - Matthias Wester-Ebbinghaus, Daniel Moldt and Michael 
Kohler-Bußmeier. From Multi-Agent to Multi-Organization Systems: 
Utilizing Middleware Approaches
   - Carole Adam, Vincent Louis and Robert Demolombe. Formalising the 
institutional interpretation of actions in an extended BDI logics

12:30  LUNCH

14:00  Session “Problem solving”
   - Mahdi Zargayouna, Flavien Balbo and Gérard Scémama. A multi-agent 
approach for the dynamic VRPTW
   - Antoine Nongaillard, Philippe Mathieu and Brigitte Jaumard. A 
Multi-Agent Resource Negotiation for the Utilitarian Social Welfare

15:30  BREAK

16:00  Session “Demonstration”
   - Eric Matson. POLAR: A Graphical, Integrated Development Environment 
for Agent Organizations
   - Fabrice Bourge, Sebastien Picant, Carole Adam, and Vincent Louis. A 
Multi-agent Mediation Platform for Automatic B2B Exchanges
   - Brendan Neville and Jeremy Pitt. Simulating Agent Societies with 
PRESAGE
   - Daniel Okouya, Virginia Dignum. OperettA: A prototype tool for the 
design, analysis and development of multi-agent organization
   - Alessandro Ricci and Michele Piunti. CARTAGO and Friends: Open 
Societies of Heterogeneous Cognitive and Reactive Agents Playing 
Altogether with Artifacts in Shared Workspaces

Evening: Welcome reception

*Thursday 25th September*

09:00  Invited talk: Klaus Fischer. Designing Multiagent Systems - A 
Model-Driven Approach

10:00  BREAK

10:30  Session “Reputation, Privacy, Security”
   - Ambra Molesini, Enrico Denti and Andrea Omicini. RBAC-MAS & SODA: 
Experimenting RBAC in AOSE
   - Isaac Pinyol and Jordi Sabater Mir. Cognitive Social Evaluations 
for Multi-Context BDI Agents
   - Ludivine Crepin, Yves Demazeau, Olivier Boissier and François 
Jacquenet. Sensitive data transaction in Hippocratic Multi-Agent Systems

12:30  LUNCH

14:00  Session “Agent-Oriented Software Engineering”
   - Sylvain Rougemaille, Jean-Paul Arcangeli, Marie-Pierre Gleizes and 
Frédéric Migeon. ADELFE Design, AMAS-ML in Action: A Case Study
   - Ibrahim Cakirlar, Erdem Eser Ekinci and Oguz Dikenelli. Exception 
Handling in Multi-Agent Systems
   - François Gaillard, Yoann Kubera, Philippe Mathieu and Sebastien 
Picault. A reverse engineering form for Multi Agent Systems
   - Joey Sik-Chun Lam, Frank Guerin, Wamberto Vasconcelos and Timothy 
Norman. Coping with Exceptions in Agent-Based Workflow Enactments

Evening:  Social Event & Gala Dinner

*Friday 26th September*

09:00  Invited talk: Paul Bourgine. Distributed Problem Solving in 
natural and artificial complex systems

10:00  BREAK

10:30  Session “Self-Organisation”
   - Ognen Paunovski, George Eleftherakis and Tony Cowling. Fuzzy 
Approach to Detection of Emergent Herd Formations in Multi-Agent Simulation
   - François Klein, Christine Bourjot and Vincent Chevrier. Controlling 
the Global Behaviour of a Reactive MAS : Reinforcement Learning Tools
   - Hugo Carr, Jeremy Pitt and Alexander Artikis. Peer Pressure as a 
Driver of Adaptation in Agent Societies

12:30  LUNCH

14:00  Session “Simulation”
   - Yoann Kubera, Philippe Mathieu and Sebastien Picault. Interaction 
Biases in Multi-Agent Simulations : An Experimental Study
   - André Campos, Frank Dignum and Virginia Dignum. From Individuals to 
Social and Vice-versa
   - Carole Bernon, Davy Capera and Jean-Pierre Mano. Engineering 
Self-Modeling Systems: Application to Biology

AIMS & SCOPE:

Software systems are undergoing dramatic changes in scale and
complexity. Whether at a planetary scale with Web-based systems or at a
microscopic scale with nanotechnologies, there is a huge amount of
components interacting dynamically. Whatever the component granularity
is, their interactions provide us with increasingly complex,
context-aware, and content-adaptive services and functionalities. There
is therefore a strong qualitative impact on the nature, substance and
style of interactions between components. At the macro-level the system
is viewed as the result of the interactions between micro-level
components. These interactions will occur in patterns and via mechanisms
that can hardly be grasped in terms of classical models of interaction.
To some extent, inspiration should be taken from natural systems and
societies for future software systems will exhibit characteristics
closer to these than to mechanical systems and traditional software
architectures. For example, future systems may need to have
self-assembling capabilities in order to enable the emergence of the
'correct' collective behaviour.

This situation poses exciting challenges to computer scientists and
software engineers. Already, software agents and multi-agent systems are
recognised as both useful abstractions and effective technologies for
the modelling and building of complex distributed applications. However,
little is done with regard to effective and methodical development of
complex software systems in terms of multi-agent societies. An urgent
need exists for novel approaches to software modelling and software
engineering that can support the successful deployment of software
systems made up of a massive number of autonomous components. We need to
enable designers to control and predict the behaviour of their systems,
but alternatively to enable emergent global system properties and
discovered functionality to be commonplace. It is very likely that such
innovations will exploit lessons from a variety of different scientific 
disciplines, such as sociology, philosophy, economics, organisation
science, modern thermodynamics, and biology. Furthermore, since these
systems will be ubiquitous, persistent, and pervasive, i.e. embedded in
the real world, we need to know what frameworks of law will facilitate
their regulation.

The sequel to successful editions since 2000, ESAW 08 remains committed
to the use of the notion of multi-agent system as seed for animated,
constructive, and highly inter-disciplinary discussions about
technologies,  methodologies, and tools for the engineering of complex
distributed applications. While the workshop places an emphasis on
practical engineering issues and applications, it also welcomes 
theoretical, philosophical, and empirical contributions, provided that
they clearly document their connection to the core applied issues.
Prospective papers about new paradigms, theories, models are also
appreciated.

Topics of interest include, but are not limited to:
- analysis, design, development and verification of agent societies
- engineering open, large-scale multi-agent systems
- models of complex distributed systems with agents and societies
- interaction-coordination patterns in agent societies
- inter-disciplinary approaches for agent societies engineering
- self-* approaches in agent societies
- security, trust and norms in agent societies
- agent-based autonomic systems
- middleware infrastructures for agent societies
- electronic institutions in agent societies
- Programming languages and IDE for agent societies
- The role of environment in MAS engineering
- organisatinal models for agent societies
- modelling and engineering simulations as agent societies
- virtual enterprises, organisations and supply chains as agent
societies
-- 
Laurent Vercouter, Maitre-Assistant / Assistant Professor
SMA Dpt/G2I Center, Ecole des Mines de St-Etienne, France
Phone: +33 4 77 42 66 03    http://www.emse.fr/~vercouter